Pulp Fiction Thursday: Cape Fear

Hurricane Florence has me thinking of North Carolina. When I heard a reference to Cape Fear on teevee, I knew what to select for this feature.

John D. MacDonald was among the best hard-boiled crime fiction writers of his era. The book was originally titled The Executioners. It was renamed Cape Fear in Hollywood because that’s where the story’s climax takes place. It’s one of the few times that movie people improved upon a book title. Subsequent editions of The Executioners all bore the title Cape Fear.

One of the few movie remakes that’s worth a damn is Martin Scorsese’s 1991 version of the original 1962 Peck-Mitchum film. Here’s the poster for Marty’s movie: